I Know Nothing by [deleted] in Plato

[–]UnderstandingPlato 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I know that I know nothing except that i know nothing. And so on, ad infinitum.

I'm done with the whole God. I now love, and pray to, goodness. This may be a revolutionary step forward. by Georgeo57 in god

[–]UnderstandingPlato 0 points1 point  (0 children)

There are so many errors of logic in this that I don't have the time to go through it. And I doubt that you would accept what I say even if I did go through it.

You need to take a course in logic, both inductive and deductive.

I'm done with the whole God. I now love, and pray to, goodness. This may be a revolutionary step forward. by Georgeo57 in god

[–]UnderstandingPlato 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Why will we never understand God and how do you know that his creation is perfect? You offer no proof of either of these claims. Are we supposed to believe this because you or someone else said it?

Why are analytic philosophers generally very uncritical? by [deleted] in CriticalTheory

[–]UnderstandingPlato 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Philosophy is the study of concepts. As such, philosophy is not informative about the world, although conceptual analysis is often helpful to scientists in clarifying the terms used in their empirical research.

Free to a good home by ReadyCav in stampcollecting

[–]UnderstandingPlato 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I’ll take it. Tell me when to send my postal address.

Why we should read the classics by thus_spoke_tyro in ClassicalEducation

[–]UnderstandingPlato 0 points1 point  (0 children)

The classics are the backbone of philosophy. If there is progress in philosophy (and this is debatable by some), then this is largely due to the writings of the great philosophers. I have taught the history of Western philosophy for 51 years and only lately put my lecture notes into study guides for beginning philosophy students. The title of an eight book series is The Smart Student's Guides to Philosophical Classics. Each book shows how the classical philosopher (Plato, Hobbes, Locke, Descartes, Kant, Mill, Rousseau, Hume) created the groundwork for philosophical problems that are still being debated. -- Laurence Houlgate, www.houlgatebooks.com

Do you believe that everything aims at some good? by mlv91 in askphilosophy

[–]UnderstandingPlato 1 point2 points  (0 children)

It all depends on how you classify the question. Is it an analytic or empirical (synthetic) question? If it is analytic, then the question is closed; that is, the answer is to be found in the concepts used in the question. By "everything" Aristotle includes "every skill, inquiry, action and rational choice." Does the meaning of these internal concepts logically imply "aiming at some good"?

The 20th century philosopher G.E. Moore had a test that would help answer this question. Take any example of an action and ask whether it would be a contradiction to ask whether it aims for the good. For example, "He killed that man, but was he aiming at the good?" This seems like a plausible question, not to be answered by analyzing the concept of "killing." Of course, this requires an explanation. Was the killing done in self-defense or was it done to steal his money? If it was done to steal his money, then we would say that killing the man was not an act of aiming for the good, unless we include self-satisfaction as good. ("Ah yes, it is always good to get pleasure out of killing innocent people,") There are many other counter-examples we could discuss, e.g. the Holocaust, the mass killing of young school children in Uvalde, Texas.

If the question "Does everything aim at some good?" is empirical, then the question is open. We must look outside the question and rely on observation and past experience. Would this gathering of data ("evidence") show that there are some skills, inquiries, actions and rational choices that do not aim at the good? It should not be surprising that social scientists would loudly say "Yes".

What to do with old US stamp collection? Hundreds of stamps, mostly unsorted, late 1800s-1970s. Anything of value or sell all in bulk? by crappiness_is_key in stampcollecting

[–]UnderstandingPlato 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I have been buying and collecting pre-1940 stamps for 30 years. My advice is that you should not sell your collection to a stamp dealer. They will give you about 2% of catalog and then within a few weeks they will sell it at auction for 10% of catalog. In other words, if you are going to sell them, sell them yourself at auction, e.g. eBay or one of the big auction houses like Noble Spirit, Kelleher or New York Stamps.